Dog killed my chickens, I killed the dog

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Taking my own advice and RETURNING to the content of the thread, neighbors with loose dogs do present a problem, both physical and political. It helps to remember that you might save a few chickens today, by being aggressive and shooting the loose dogs, and few people here would blame you... but they do not live next door to you, in a position to do you and your animals harm. Angry neighbors can be a REAL problem, and people who lose dogs can have long memories, even if it was their own fault.

There have been a number of very good suggestions on this thread, most especially the suggestion of attaching 2x4 wire to the bottom of the fence and burying it. I used a heavier gauge of fence and did something similar, when the hot wire failed to stop determined coyotes. Where poultry, or in fact any livestock is concerned, the better your fences the better off you are, and your fences should be built not to hold your livestock, but to repel predators. I build my chicken pens out of chain link instead of chicken wire for this reason, and I bury a length of fence to prevent digging under. In my case, I used chain link because I had plenty, and also because it would withstand burying better than welded wire. I attached it firmly to the bottom of the fence with tension wire, dug down about 12 inches and then OUT another 3 feet, resulting in a trench 1 foot deep and 3 feet across.. 4 foot chainlink was then tagged straight down 12 inches down and then flattened out to extend three feet out from the fence, if you can envision this. Then the earth was replaced. So far, it has managed to withstand assault for 5 yrs and counting. Animals that try to dig under start at the fence line, and hit the vertical portion of the buried link; if they bother trying to dig past it, they give up after a foot or so.
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Taking my own advice and RETURNING to the content of the thread, neighbors with loose dogs do present a problem, both physical and political. It helps to remember that you might save a few chickens today, by being aggressive and shooting the loose dogs, and few people here would blame you... but they do not live next door to you, in a position to do you and your animals harm. Angry neighbors can be a REAL problem, and people who lose dogs can have long memories, even if it was their own fault.

There have been a number of very good suggestions on this thread, most especially the suggestion of attaching 2x4 wire to the bottom of the fence and burying it. I used a heavier gauge of fence and did something similar, when the hot wire failed to stop determined coyotes. Where poultry, or in fact any livestock is concerned, the better your fences the better off you are, and your fences should be built not to hold your livestock, but to repel predators. I build my chicken pens out of chain link instead of chicken wire for this reason, and I bury a length of fence to prevent digging under. In my case, I used chain link because I had plenty, and also because it would withstand burying better than welded wire. I attached it firmly to the bottom of the fence with tension wire, dug down about 12 inches and then OUT another 3 feet, resulting in a trench 1 foot deep and 3 feet across.. 4 foot chainlink was then tagged straight down 12 inches down and then flattened out to extend three feet out from the fence, if you can envision this. Then the earth was replaced. So far, it has managed to withstand assault for 5 yrs and counting. Animals that try to dig under start at the fence line, and hit the vertical portion of the buried link; if they bother trying to dig past it, they give up after a foot or so.
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hmmm, I have a friend offering to give up some fence if i remove it, guessing i should and do this method. Better than poisoning the neighborhood I guess. Have you looked at the fence after 5 years in the ground? Wondering how it holds up under there.
 
hmmm, I have a friend offering to give up some fence if i remove it, guessing i should and do this method. Better than poisoning the neighborhood I guess. Have you looked at the fence after 5 years in the ground? Wondering how it holds up under there.
Actually, yeah; my son and I are moving all our pens this year and we pulled up the old chain when we did, intending to junk it if it was rotten, but it had help up surprisingly well. It's kind of rusty in spots, but it didn't rot out like I figured, so we are going to reuse it. I can tell you it is a PITA to bury it that far out, but it has sure been worth all the work. Before I got hurt, I had a LOT of poultry, and several rare breeds that were pretty valuable, where losing one bird could be a serious blow. We had a rash of problems with a neighbor across the street who moved in from the city with her dog, and figured since the rest of us had dogs that ran loose, she could just let her big German Shepherd that was totally NOT farm trained, run around loose too. He came over to my place, tore the side out of my duck house going through the WOOD, and destroyed about $300 worth of show quality pastel call ducks. I took the miscreant home, still covered with blood and feathers, and presented him to his owner, who had the nerve to insist, well, I couldn't PROVE he killed the ducks, it could have been a coyote and he came along after the fact... The sheriff did not agree, and told her to keep the dog up and pay for my ducks. After that incident, I started wrapping chain link around the buildings too. A determined large dog can gnaw enough of a hole to get a foot or their muzzle through, and then start ripping out boards. It often seems as soon as you solve one problem, another presents itself.
 
OUCH! Sorry. Luckily, I have mine inside a 7' privacy fence with 2 90+ pounds dogs that are too lazy to care about them, but seem to HATE raccoons and squirrels, so I'm hoping they will be OK, but keep hearing about raccoon damage, and thinking I should just make it happen and bury some fence before they get killed. I have a small flock, so any death sets me back.:( Hope your neoghbor learned a lesson?
 
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